Zurich-American Insurance v. Liberty Mutual Insurance

This is an appeal from a declaratoiy judgment determining the obligations, under Insurance Code section 11580.9, 1 of two insurance companies whose policies cover the same motor vehicle involved in a traffic accident, out of which a liability loss arose.

*484 The following facts were established by stipulation, or are otherwise undisputed, or findings not contested: 2 On August 1, 1974, Robert Roesies, dba Robbie’s Truck Painting,(Roesies), was driving a 1973 Ford truck with the permission of the truck owner, Peck Road Ford Truck Sales (Peck), when he struck a bicycle ridden by Salvador Robles, a minor. Peck, who is in the business of selling motor vehicles, had orally hired Roesies to repair and paint the front fender of the truck. After the completion of the repairs, Peck requested Roesies to drive the truck to a muffler shop, at which place Peck was to take possession. Under customary procedure, Roesies would have delivered the truck to the Peck place of business. Roesies was en route to the muffler shop when the accident occurred.

Robles, by and through his guardian ad litem, filed a complaint for personal injuries, charging that Roesies, personally and as Robbie’s…

I respectfully disagree. If this case involved an important moral issue, I might join the majority in an interpretation of section 11580.9 of the Insurance Code which involves, as I shall demonstrate, some rather massive rewriting. Since, however, the case involves nothing more than a straightforward application of a code section which attempted to make statutory order out of decisional chaos, I protest against an interpretation which unnecessarily ignores the clear language of section 11580.9—a section which the Legislature apparently wanted to keep unsoiled from excessive judicial gloss, declaring in section 11580.8 that it “expresses the total public policy of this state respecting the order in which two or more . . . policies . . . shall apply,...”

The basic policy which section 11580.9 expresses is the one stated in subdivision (d) and applied by the trial court—that the policy which describes the vehicle as an owned vehicle is the one that bears the loss. Since this provision usually becomes relevant when some other applicable policy was issued to the'driver who was actually at fault, I deduce from the statute that the Legislature was not primarily interested in dumping the…

This is an appeal from a declaratory judgment determining the obligations, under Insurance Code section 11580.9, [1] of two insurance companies whose policies cover the same motor vehicle involved in a traffic accident, out of which a liability loss arose.

The following facts were established by stipulation, or are otherwise undisputed, or findings not contested: [2] On August 1, 1974, Robert Roesies, dba Robbie's Truck Painting (Roesies), was driving a 1973 Ford truck with the permission of the truck owner, Peck Road Ford Truck Sales (Peck), when he struck a bicycle ridden by Salvador Robles, a minor. Peck, who is in the business of selling motor vehicles, had orally hired Roesies to repair and paint the front fender of the truck. After the completion of the repairs, Peck requested Roesies to drive the truck to a muffler shop, at which place Peck was to take possession. Under customary procedure, Roesies would have delivered the truck to the Peck place of business. Roesies was en route to the muffler shop when the accident occurred.

Robles, by and through his guardian ad litem, filed a complaint for personal injuries, charging that Roesies, personally and…